At 17, most people still view you as a child. At 17, I am still viewed as a child, even though i’ve seen more than any of my friends, even though i’ve wanted to die longer than anyone i know.

It started at a really young age i guess, i was about 7 when i first tried to hurt myself, my mum had this boyfriend and he seemed to enjoy beating her up in front of me and my brother. he scared me so much. i would cry myself to sleep most nights, rocking backwards and fowards to my mums sobs. One night, i sat at the top of the stairs with my brother while her boyfriend raped her, she tried to be quiet so that we wouldn’t hear. that was the night i heard a knife call me.

The first time i self harmed i was so scared that i cried and cried, after i just remember thinking how wrong it was for a child to be doing it, so i stopped. i hid away all my suicidal urges for years. but as always, after some time, id become angry. id hate myself, id hate my mum, id even hate my brother because he didnt stop any of it from happening and he always seemed so much older, wiser, stronger to me. worst of all, i would have a deep contempt for the world. i used to make my brother so angry he’d beat me up just do i didnt have to do it myself.

over the next few years, my mum continued to have boyfriends that hit her, the last was about 2 years ago and im still having nightmares about it. during the course of these boyfriends i tried to kill myself 12 times. once i took somany pills that my mum thought we’d had them all robbed. She doesnt know. i triend to hang myself, i just could never get the hang of the noose. i have over 1000 scars on my body from different attempts to slit arteries and veins. For some reason it never worked.

I haven’t cut myself or tried to kill myself for nearly a year now. It’s hard. Every day im plagued by thoughts of death, if not my own then every one else’s. yesterday, i was in the car with my brother, we were goin really fast, about 100 mph i think, and i just felt like throwing myself out. i imagined the tarmac against my skin. But i didn’t do it.

it’s not that i think anyone would miss me, i know they wouldnt. i doubt my mum would even realise i hadnt come home if the police didnt knock her door to tell her i was dead. she uses me as an anger management method. every time something goes wrong in her life, my brothers life, the world, its my fault. she can shout and scream at me til shes blue, she can beat me black and blue, but i wont care. ill keep on living to spite her and to help the rest of the world.

i want a future. i want to help children who have had it as bad as me, even worse than me. i want to help people who think they cant escape because i have. even if it is only out of my contempt for the world around me. i’m almost happy. just 2 more years and i will be free from the tyrannical ***** who holds me here. just 2 more years and i will be happy. just 2 more years and this nightmare will all be over.